The Journal - The Historyapolis Projecthttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/the-historyapolis-project
Kirsten Delegard is director of the Historyapolis Project, which is part of the history department at Augsburg College. The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. During 2014, Delegard is compiling an inventory of historical resources pertinent to Minneapolis with the help of a team of students and citizen-researchers associated with the Historyapolis Lab. For more details visit our website at www.historyapolis.com. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society.
enRemembering a civil rights herohttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/remembering-a-civil-rights-hero
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<span class="field-slideshow-caption-text">Anthony Brutus Cassius at his downtown bar, sometime in the 1950s. Thanks to the Special Collections Department of Hennepin County Library (especially librarian Bailey Diers) for providing this image.</span>
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kirsten Delegard</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>Minneapolitans love to imagine that their community was never fettered by Jim Crow restrictions. Longtime civil rights leader Anthony Brutus Cassius liked to complicate this idyllic vision. In the 1970s, when Minneapolis enjoyed national renown as a model metropolis, he would tell newcomers that the city was Janus-faced about its racial prejudices: “Don’t be fooled by appearances.” And later — in an oral history conducted right before his death — he was blunter. “There were great restrictions placed on blacks,” he declared.</p>
<p>February is Black History Month. Each year it prompts us to remember how African Americans have shaped our community. Our cityscape provides some reminders of past giants. Labor activist and politician Nellie Stone Johnson has a school in North Minneapolis that bears her name. A short street parallel to the Midtown Greenway testifies to the legacy of newspaper editor and civil rights crusader Cecil Newman. The home of Lena Olive Smith — NAACP president and civil rights attorney — has been placed on the National Register of Historic Places. But there is nothing in the urban landscape to commemorate A. B. Cassius, who labored for sixty years to build interracial community and improve the lives of African Americans.</p>
<p>Born in 1907 into a family of 18 children, Cassius fled racial violence in Oklahoma at age 13. Landing in St. Paul — where he slept in the basement of a hotel where he worked as a janitor — he enrolled at Mechanics Arts High School and excelled at both academics and football. This impressive record barely pried open the doors of higher education. The only school that offered him a partial scholarship was the divinity school at Macalester College. Cassius lasted two years before deciding the ministry was not for him.</p>
<p>Cassius left college in 1929 on the cusp of the stock market crash. He found one of the only jobs open to African Americans and moved across the Mississippi River to become a waiter at the Curtis Hotel, which had an all-black staff that served an all-white management and clientele. Waiters at the Curtis made only $17 per month while their white counterparts brought home $75. Cassius addressed this injustice by throwing himself into the labor movement, organizing a waiters’ union. The union negotiated higher wages and eventually brought a lawsuit against the hotel, winning back pay for its members.</p>
<p>Cassius paired labor organizing with a passion for civil rights. To organize protests against the 1930 re-release of "The Birth of the Nation," the film lionizing the Ku Klux Klan, he joined a group that called itself the Minnesota Club. This was an elite cadre of Minneapolitans that included Lena Olive Smith (the first African-American woman to become a lawyer in Minnesota); a prominent local physician named Dr. William Brown; journalist Herbert Howell and another man named Clifford Rucker. “We met once a month in Fosters Sweet Shop” which was located at 6th and Lyndale on the city’s north side, Cassius remembered in 1982. “We met in the back and all they wanted us to do if we met there was to buy a dish of ice cream.” </p>
<p>It might have been these sessions at Foster’s Sweet Shop — where activists could trade the price of a bowl of ice cream for a space to strategize for civil rights — that taught Cassius the importance of social entrepreneurship. In 1937, he went into business for himself, establishing the Dreamland Cafe at 38th Street and 4th Avenue, the heart of the African-American community on the south side. The Cafe quickly became known as a nice restaurant that welcomed African Americans at a time when the fancy restaurants downtown were off limits to anyone who was not white. It became a favorite stop for celebrities like Lena Horne, who stayed with African American families in the neighborhood during their visits since, as Cassius recalled: “a Negro couldn’t stay in a downtown Minneapolis hotel.” </p>
<p>But the Dreamland was more than just a place to eat dinner. “The Dreamland,” neighborhood activist Nelson Peery remembered, “was our only social center.” A rare public space that welcomed people of all races at a time when the city was rigidly segregated, it laid the foundation for social change. Cassius “always conducted himself as if he were responsible to and for the people in our neighborhood,” Peery recalled in his autobiography. “Concerned about the Negro people, always contributing to some cause, Mr. Cassius was the first ‘race man’ I met.” Cassius’ establishment welcomed young talkers and dreamers like Peery, who would spend his life working for social justice and civil rights.</p>
<p>Emboldened by his success with Dreamland, Cassius sought to open a full bar downtown in 1946. His application for a liquor license was turned down after he was told that African Americans could only operate “barbecues, shoeshine parlors and barbershops.” It wasn’t until 1949 — after a protracted fight over licensing and financing — that the Cassius Club Cafe opened on 3rd street.</p>
<p>With this new establishment, Cassius broke all kinds of new ground. He was the first African American in Minneapolis to be granted a liquor license; he was also the first African American to get a substantial loan from a major bank to start a business. And before the grassroots civil rights movement of the 1950s, he created the first place in downtown Minneapolis where whites and African Americans could mingle in elegant surroundings.</p>
<p>Cassius remained a strong supporter of the labor movement and the civil rights movement, using his business success to give back to the community. He funded college scholarships and championed jobs programs. In 1980, Cassius retired and shuttered his bar; he declared his intention to finish his college degree. He died three years later and the building that housed his bar — located at 318 S. 3rd street — burned down in 1991.</p>
<p><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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<p>Sources: “Anthony Cassius, black bartender-philosopher, died” Star Tribune, August 4, 1983; Kevin Diaz, “Fire destroys historic bar,” Star Tribune, October 15, 1991; “A Brutus Cassius Opens Dreamland Cafe Mpls Newest,” Minneapolis Spokesman-Recorder. December 8, 1939; Nelson Peery, Black Fire: The Making of an American Revolutionary ((New York: The New Press, 1994); Jennifer A. Delton, “Labor, Politics, and African American Identity in Minneapolis, 1930-50,” Minnesota History, Winter 2001-2002; Carol Ross interview with Anthony Brutus Cassius, December 1, 1981 and February 3, 1982, Twentieth Century Radicalism in Minnesota Oral History Project, Minnesota Historical Society.</p>
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</div></div></div>Mon, 09 Feb 2015 20:25:35 +0000Sarah McKenzie24366 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/remembering-a-civil-rights-hero#commentsOrganizers of Reverse Freedom Rides targeted Minneapolishttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/organizers-of-reverse-freedom-rides-targeted-minneapolis
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">By Heidi Heller</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p align="left">One of the most memorable episodes of the Civil Rights Movement was the 1961 Freedom Rides.</p>
<p align="left">In contrast, few people have ever heard about the 1962 “Reverse Freedom Rides,” designed as a response to the brave protest of the previous year. Organized by Southern segregationists to embarrass Northern supporters of the freedom struggle, the “Reverse Freedom Rides” were a flop.</p>
<p align="left">Fifty years later, this episode is worth revisiting for what it reveals about perceptions of Minneapolis in the 1960s. Today, our city is known for its racial disparities. Fifty years ago, it was known as a wellspring of support for civil rights.</p>
<p align="left">The Freedom Rides were organized by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) to challenge the segregation of interstate travel. Between May and November in 1961 racially mixed groups boarded buses and traveled together through the deep south where they were greeted by police and angry mobs. Riders risked their lives to illuminate the brutality of Jim Crow in the hopes of forcing a response from the federal government, which had chosen to ignore discriminatory practices in the South.</p>
<p align="left">In the aftermath of the Freedom Rides, a group of segregationists associated with the White Citizens Council in New Orleans vowed to retaliate against northern supporters of the movement. Led by George Singelmann, this group from Louisiana devised a mean-spirited publicity stunt that sought to “expose the hypocrisy” of Northern communities. They recruited African Americans interested in leaving the South and gave them one-way bus tickets and a promise that “northern cities will certainly welcome you and help you get settled.” Participants were unaware that the communities at the end of their journey were unprepared for their arrival.</p>
<p align="left">The group targeted communities that had produced supporters of civil rights — like Hyannis, Mass., which was home to President Kennedy’s family compound. In December 1962, Singelmann turned his attention to Minneapolis, which seen as the home of Senator Hubert Humphrey, the former Minneapolis mayor and a known champion of civil rights. Singelmann asserted that “Senator Humphrey is the No. 1 exponent of civil rights in the nation. And we feel therefore, that it is fitting for him to have some of Louisiana’s fine Negro citizens as his dinner guest on Christmas Day.”</p>
<p align="left">A memo tucked away in Mayor Naftalin’s Commission on Human Relations files in the Tower Archives at City Hall explains that a number of “Reverse Freedom Riders” were expected to arrive in Minneapolis on Christmas Day in 1962. The city made preparations for assisting these individuals once they arrived.</p>
<p align="left">The White Citizen Council argued that an influx of southern migrants would show the gap between the rhetoric of civil rights and the reality of racial attitudes in the North. They selected participants they believed would “exhibit the Negroes as face-to-face examples of racial inferiority, fully justifying the philosophy of the segregationists.”</p>
<p align="left">Ultimately, the riders never arrived in Minneapolis. Negative attention forced Singelmann to rethink his plans. But had he moved forward, Minneapolis stood at the ready to ensure this racist scheme would flounder on the shoals of its obviously malicious intent.</p>
<p align="left">As for the “Reverse Freedom Riders” who did end up traveling north, many of them took advantage of the opportunity provided by the segregationists. They used the free bus tickets to get out of the South and make a better life for their children. </p>
<p align="left"><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Tue, 13 Jan 2015 17:08:21 +0000Sarah McKenzie24236 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/organizers-of-reverse-freedom-rides-targeted-minneapolis#commentsBuilding the city’s sewer system was an ambitious, dangerous undertakinghttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/building-the-citys-sewer-system-was-an-ambitious-dangerous-undertaking
<div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kevin Ehrman-Solberg</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>While contemporary Minneapolitans take safe drinking water and flushing toilets for granted, denizens of the Mill City were not so fortunate in the late 19th century. In these years, Minneapolis joined cities around the world in grappling with the consequences of unprecedented urbanization. One of the most pressing challenges of this new human density was the question of waste. Cities had to figure out what to do with their often overwhelming supply of excrement. </p>
<p>The answer to this problem: sewers.</p>
<p>City dwellers today cannot imagine life without this underground network of tunnels. But this infrastructure did not just appear. It had to be built. Its construction was expensive and dangerous. And it was watched with great anticipation by everyone in the city.</p>
<p>At the end of the 19th century, the local press regularly printed summaries of new sewer networks, often on the front page. In 1888, the Daily Globe sent a journalist on a “trip through the big hole” to report on the “sight and scenes” of the “great sewer tunnel which will drain North Minneapolis.”</p>
<p>The tunnels themselves were often over a 100 feet underground. They were dug initially with pick-axes, and then with pneumatic drills as the century progressed. Sewer workers “clad in rubber and each with a lantern,” would toil in these subterranean spaces to complete the “difficult, dangerous, and tedious piece of work.”</p>
<p>In 1887, a sewer crew excavating underneath downtown Minneapolis accidently tunneled into a natural cave. According to the Daily Globe, this caused a “great mass of debris” to come “crash[ing] down into the tunnel.” No one was hurt in the collapse, but workers were not always so lucky. Alex Peterson, the “blasting boss” for the Minnehaha tunnel, was seriously injured in a cave-in on Aug. 5, 1922. That same year, a sewer worker named Fred Gardner died in a different collapse in the Garfield Street tunnel in Northeast Minneapolis.</p>
<p>The tunnels were dangerous and expensive to construct but the city had no choice but to expand its sewer system year by year. The community was enduring recurring epidemics of typhoid, a water-borne illness that spread when sewage and drinking water intermingled. According to the Annual Report of the Board of Health, 1897 alone saw 1,534 reported cases and 148 deaths.</p>
<p>In April 1921, work was launched on the Minnehaha sewer tunnel, one of the largest public projects in the city’s history. A group of 500 residents gathered to help celebrate the ground breaking with festivities organized by the Minnehaha-Nokomis Improvement Association. The Longfellow community orchestra and the Minnehaha school glee club performed.</p>
<p>Over the next decade, the project would employ hundreds of workers — earning $1.50 an hour — to dig, chip, and explode their way through miles of solid sandstone. These images, which is from the Tower Archives in Minneapolis City Hall, document these subterranean labors. </p>
<p><img src="/sites/default/files/images/articles/12/16/2014/Sewer%20Workers%20with%20Cart.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="441" class="inline_image" /></p>
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<p>The completed line ran from Minnehaha Parkway to East 52nd street before veering west and exiting into the river. There was one major problem with this ambitious effort. While the tunnel flushed sewage away from the homes of South Minneapolis, it drained straight into the Mississippi River, which was also the source for the city’s drinking water. This created a health hazard that was only remedied by a waste water plant constructed by the Works Progress Administration in 1938. Today these sewage outfalls into the Mississippi River have been converted into storm drains.</p>
<p><em>These images are from the archives of the City of Minneapolis. Thanks to Bob McCune and Josh Schaffer of the City of Minneapolis Records Department for assisting us with these materials.</em></p>
<p><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. During 2014, Delegard is compiling an inventory of historical resources pertinent to Minneapolis with the help of a team of students and citizen-researchers associated with the Historyapolis Lab. For more details visit our website at <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
</div></div></div>Tue, 16 Dec 2014 20:14:44 +0000Sarah McKenzie24152 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/building-the-citys-sewer-system-was-an-ambitious-dangerous-undertaking#commentsUnearthing the history of a Minneapolis sanatoriumhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/unearthing-the-history-of-a-minneapolis-sanatorium
<div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kirsten Delegard</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>A little less than 100 years ago, this group of unsmiling jesters and grim-looking clowns gathered at Hopewell Hospital for this haunting Halloween photo. Any celebration that followed was likely fairly somber. Because it was held on a quarantine ward.</p>
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<p>Hopewell Hospital was the Minneapolis tuberculosis sanatorium. Situated in an isolated industrial quarter of the Camden neighborhood, the hospital looked out over city workhouse, the garbage “crematorium” and the brickworks on the Mississippi River.</p>
<p>Established in 1907, the facility housed the city’s tuberculosis sufferers, who were seen as an acute threat to the community. A bacterial infection that attacks the lungs and is easily transmitted through air droplets, tuberculosis was a common and deadly killer in these days before life-saving antibiotics. It spread easily in the overcrowded quarters of American urban neighborhoods; tens of thousands of Minnesotans died from tuberculosis.</p>
<p>Thanks to the recent outbreak of Ebola, Americans are <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/26/kaci-hickox-quarantine_n_6050312.html">grappling anew</a> with the question of quarantine. Though less common today thanks to widespread vaccinations and highly effective antibiotic treatments, the practice of quarantine was widespread in 1917, when this image was likely created. In the United States, local governments had imposed quarantines since the 18th century. Starting in the late 19th century, <a href="http://www.cdc.gov/quarantine/historyquarantine.html">federal authorities had played an ever-larger role</a> in this process, focusing their efforts on quarantining individuals with tuberculosis, cholera, diphtheria, plague and yellow fever.</p>
<p>These patients were separated according to their malady. Minneapolitans with smallpox were brought to a facility located in present-day St. Louis Park. Hopewell treated tuberculosis patients until 1924, when Hennepin County decided to bring all sufferers of this disease under the same roof at Glen Lake Sanatorium in modern-day Eden Prairie. The Camden facility was re-christened Parkview Sanatorium and continued service as a public charity hospital until the building was eventually razed.</p>
<p>A Halloween photo from the closed ward of a TB sanatorium may be the stuff of nightmares. Or inspiration for a new gothic <a href="http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2011/05/miss-peregrines-home-for-peculiar-children-ransom-riggs.html">novel by Ransom Rig</a>gs set in the post-industrial landscape of the city’s North Side.</p>
<p>But this image ultimately seems more poignant than terrifying. We have no way to know the fate of these revelers and whether they survived their encounters with this deadly bacteria.</p>
<p>Hopewell Hospital is gone, is foundations buried under North Mississippi Regional Park. Next time you amble along this part of the river, think about these forgotten Minneapolitans and the myriad connections between the living and the dead in our city.</p>
<p>The photo is from the Hennepin Medical History Center at Hennepin County Medical Center via the Minnesota Digital Library. The detail from the 1914 plat map of Minneapolis is from the Minneapolis Collection at Hennepin County Libraries Special Collections. Special thanks to librarian Ted Hathaway for providing Historyapolis with a high-resolution version of this image. </p>
<p><em>Kirsten Delegard is director of the Historyapolis Project, which is part of the history department at Augsburg College. The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. During 2014, Delegard is compiling an inventory of historical resources pertinent to Minneapolis with the help of a team of students and citizen-researchers associated with the Historyapolis Lab. For more details visit our website at <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Wed, 19 Nov 2014 19:36:09 +0000Sarah McKenzie24037 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/unearthing-the-history-of-a-minneapolis-sanatorium#commentsTracing the roots of the city’s brewing industryhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/tracing-the-roots-of-the-city
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Heidi Heller</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p align="left">When Prohibition became the law of the land in 1920, most Americans assumed that beer brewing would become a dead art. Politicians like Hennepin County Sheriff Earle Brown loved smashing stills like the one pictured here for the media, demonstrating for the public their commitment to the campaign against demon rum.</p>
<p align="left">With hindsight, we now know that Prohibition did little to stop the production of alcohol, though its manufacture moved underground. But the national ban on alcohol did help to destroy the historic beer brewing industry in Minneapolis. Brewing did not enjoy a revival in Minneapolis until the last years of the 20th century, a rebirth that many residents celebrated this month during Oktoberfest.</p>
<p align="left">Brewing first became a commercial enterprise in Minneapolis in 1850, when immigrant John Orth went into business at 13th Avenue and Marshall Street Northeast, establishing what would be the second brewery in Minnesota. Other entrepreneurs quickly followed Orth’s lead. In 1857, the Mississippi Brewery (later Gluek Brewing Co.) appeared at 20th Avenue and Marshall Street Northeast; the Nicholas Bofferding Brewery opened in North Minneapolis. Competition grew when nine breweries opened in the aftermath of the Civil War. They were joined by 12 additional operations between 1894–1905.</p>
<p align="left">Minneapolis brewers vied with one another. They also fought off competition from larger cities like St. Louis and Chicago, where brewers invested in new technologies like pasteurization that allowed them to distribute their product over a wide geographic area. To survive in the face of intensifying competition, brewers in Minneapolis began to pool their resources. The biggest merger occurred in July 1890 when four breweries — John Orth Brewing Company, Heinrich Brewing Association, F.D. Noerenberg and Germania Brewing Association — became one. The new company was known as the Minneapolis Brewing Company and eventually consolidated all its operations at Marshall Street Northeast. In the years after the merger, Grain Belt Beer would become the flagship brand for the company. In 1967, the company would change its name to Grain Belt Breweries Inc.</p>
<p align="left">Prohibition forced small brewers out of business. And the largest operations — namely the Minneapolis Brewing Company and Gluek — shifted to the production of near beer and soft drinks. But these new products did not generate enough profits and by 1929 both Gluek and the Minneapolis Brewing Company had shuttered their doors. When Prohibition was lifted in 1933, Gluek and the Minneapolis Brewing Company immediately resumed production of beer and as Alvin Gluek proclaimed they would provide “liquid balm for the sorrowing.”</p>
<p align="left">In the years to follow, no other breweries would emerge to assist in providing this liquid balm. By the 1960s and 1970s, the two surviving Minneapolis breweries would succumb to changing industry conditions. Both Gluek and Grain Belt Brewing were sold to G. Heileman Brewing in Wisconsin. The Gluek Brewery was demolished in 1966, but the Grain Belt building still remains a landmark in Northeast and has been converted to office space, a library and other uses.</p>
<p align="left">Brewing did not return to Minneapolis until 1986 when the James Page Brewing Company began local production and opened a new chapter in the production of beer.</p>
<p align="left"><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Wed, 15 Oct 2014 20:13:11 +0000Sarah McKenzie23809 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/tracing-the-roots-of-the-city#commentsA trip back to 70s-era Hennepin http://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/a-trip-back-to-70s-era-hennepin
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kirsten Delegard</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>In the spring of 1970, an employee of Minneapolis city government did a photographic survey of Hennepin Avenue downtown. The goal was to document six blocks of the city's most famous avenue, its oldest commercial strip, originally developed as the main artery for the 19th century metropolis.</p>
<p>The photographer walked the east and the west side of the street, taking a series of black and white snapshots in quick succession. The images were developed, printed and then taped into two crude panoramas. At some point, these rolls of photographs were deposited in a box that landed in the tower archives at Minneapolis City Hall. That's where Historyapolis researchers found them this spring.</p>
<p>We unfurled the chain of connected images on a table in the archives. <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">The vintage facades of Hennepin Avenue in the Mary Tyler Moore era came alive for us.</a> The street's legendary establishments were all there: the Hotel Andrews; Augie's Theatre Lounge; the Brass Rail; Rifle Sport; Shinders Bookstore; the Poodle Club; the Saddle Bar; Plantation Pancakes; Music City and Musicland; the Hi-Lo 29 Bar; and the Gay '90s. We saw the legendary "620 Club–Where Turkey was King," though it was already shuttered by the time these photos were taken. This club — owned by Vikings owner Max Winter — was a center for action downtown in the 1950s, attracting the patronage of sports figures, reporters, business people, entertainers and FBI agents, who sat at "the Round Table," which barred women from joining in the conversation. This night spot was next door to the Great Northern Market, known for its cuts of meat and sawdust on the floor. It showed the Cafe di Napoli, which according to Minneapolis booster and columnist Barbara Flanagan was one of the "few good restaurants left on that street worth visiting."</p>
<p>The photographs had no dates. But the marquees of the Orpheum, the State, the Mann and the Gopher gave us the clues we needed. The Orpheum Theater — a first run cinema at this point — was advertising "Halls of Anger," which was released on April 29th, 1970. "A Man Called Horse," which came out on the same day, played at another venue down the block.</p>
<p>This panorama was created to provide an utilitarian and unvarnished portrait of the city's grittiest blocks for urban planners and community leaders. In 1966, the Minneapolis Star called Hennepin Avenue "a street with a personality problem, beckoning only the more adventuresome to its strip joints, paperback bookstores and streetwalking businesswomen and their agents." Two years later, a massive redevelopment of Nicollet Avenue was unveiled. The shopping street had been redesigned into a pedestrian mall that captured the attention of urban planners around the world. </p>
<p>Hennepin was seen as the antithesis of its sister street. "If the Avenues of downtown Minneapolis were personalized, Hennepin would probably be the disheveled and somewhat uninhibited spouse of the well-dressed and proper Nicollet Mall," a report to the mayor declared. "They are an inseparable pair, going everywhere together, even though the degree of Hennepin's drinking problem and its deportment and appearance does affect the image of the entire family."</p>
<p>City leaders vowed to erase this blemish on their otherwise model downtown. The problem of Hennepin Avenue was taken up by the Walker Art Center, which worked with the Minneapolis Downtown Council and the city Planning Department to solicit proposals from artists, architects, designers and urban planners on how to remake the entertainment district. They hosted a symposium on April 25–26, 1970 which likely inspired the making of this panorama.</p>
<p>These plans never made it off the drawing board. By the end of the decade, critics of urban redevelopment were ascendant. And local artists like Patrick Scully articulated a new enthusiasm for the seamy ambience of the city's entertainment district. In 1982, Scully used these "problem" blocks as the backdrop for a set of conceptual dance and music pieces that he stitched into a quirky film called "Shinders to Shinders." Scully celebrated the edgy vitality of the "Avenue," recasting this stretch of Hennepin as the epicenter of funky, new-wave urbanity.</p>
<p>It was not until the 1990s that the blocks shown here were subjected to a comprehensive redevelopment plan, which changed the streetscape but not the gritty character of the city's entertainment district.</p>
<p><em>Kirsten Delegard is director of the Historyapolis Project, which is part of the history department at Augsburg College. The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. During 2014, Delegard is compiling an inventory of historical resources pertinent to Minneapolis with the help of a team of students and citizen-researchers associated with the Historyapolis Lab. For more details visit our website at <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/"><strong>www.historyapolis.com</strong></a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Wed, 13 Aug 2014 18:43:30 +0000Sarah McKenzie23413 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/a-trip-back-to-70s-era-hennepin#commentsRevisiting one of the ugliest chapters in Minneapolis history http://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/revisiting-one-of-the-ugliest-chapters-in-minneapolis-history
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<img class="field-slideshow-image field-slideshow-image-1" typeof="foaf:Image" src="http://www.journalmpls.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/images/articles/07/31/2014/mob-web.jpg" width="630" height="470" alt="" /> </div>
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kirsten Delegard</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>Minneapolis usually imagines itself at play in July, when long, warm days invite us to enjoy our beloved parks and lakes. Yet throughout the 20th century, July was a time of bitter conflict. In 1967, it brought urban unrest on Plymouth Avenue; in 1934, the Truckers' Strike; and in 1931, the siege of the Lee family home.</p>
<p>This mob attack in July 1931 was the ugliest racial clash in the city's history. Edith and Arthur Lee bought a small bungalow on the corner of 46th and Columbus Avenue South. The neighborhood exploded in rage.</p>
<p>The new property owners were African American. The neighborhood was all white.</p>
<p>Before the Lee family bought their home, neighborhood activism had purged the blocks around 46th and Columbus of non-white denizens. In 1927, residents had formed the Eugene Field Neighborhood Association. Under the auspices of this group, 100 residents had signed a voluntary "gentleman's agreement" that barred them from selling or renting their property to anyone who was "not of the Caucasian race." Starting in 1930, members of this group had bought homes owned by African Americans in the hopes of making this corner of the city an all-white "restricted district."</p>
<p>Residents mobilized at the news that a homeowner had decided to settle a grudge with his neighbors by selling his property to an African American. First they offered to buy the property from the Lees, promising ever-larger sums to the postal clerk and his wife in exchange for their departure from the neighborhood. When these offers were rebuffed, they threw garbage and "refuse of a more unpleasant form" on the lawn. They hurled black paint on the house and garage. They staked threatening signs in front of the house: "We don't want niggers here" and "No niggers allowed in this neighborhood — this means you." After dark the family was visited by roving gangs, which yelled epithets and threw stones, bricks and firecrackers. One night, someone killed the family dog.</p>
<p>Neighborhood activists had been <a href="http://historyapolis.com/race-war-continued-linden-hills-1909/">using these tactics</a> for years in Minneapolis <a href="http://historyapolis.com/minneapolis-race-war-1909-prospect-park/">to keep African-American property owners</a> out of <a href="http://historyapolis.com/they-know-they-are-undesirable-as-neighbors/">white sections of the city</a>. But this new homeowner had more resources than most to withstand this pressure. Thanks to his job at the U.S. Post Office, Lee had economic security at a time when the Great Depression had thrown one third of the city out of work. Moreover, his service in the American military during World War I had left him with the belief that he should enjoy the rights of full citizenship, regardless of race. "Nobody asked me to move out when I was in France fighting in mud and water for this country," he declared. "I came out here to make this house my home. I have a right to establish a home!"</p>
<p>Yet the opposition of Lee's new neighbors proved hard to overcome. On July 9 they declared their determination to restore the racial purity of the neighborhood, phoning Lee to give notice that 500 people would storm his house. Lee summoned the police, which ignored his plea for help. He then turned to fellow veterans at his American Legion post, who organized an armed vigil to protect the family.</p>
<p>The veterans held the crowd at bay. But over the days that followed, the mob outside the house continued to grow, doubling in size after news of the conflict was reported in the Minneapolis Tribune on July 15 and 16. One eyewitness recalled how spectators traveled from around the state to witness the siege: </p>
<p><em>I have never seen anything like it. Here were literally five or six thousand people, men, women and children, both on the curbs and sidewalks, just standing and waiting as near as they could get to this little, dark house. . .Six thousand white people, waiting to see that house burned.</em></p>
<p>After a speaker at nearby Field School called on the crowd to exhibit "sanity and patience" as well as respect for "principles of human and property rights," listeners walked out in protest. They swelled the mob outside of the house, where pushcart vendors were reaping the profits of prejudice, supplying refreshments to the horde. Some of the rowdies practiced marching in military formation, in preparation to storm the house; others threw stones; still others demanded immediate action, shouting "Let's rush the door" and "Let's drag the niggers out." This scene was captured in this 1931 photo from the NAACP publication "The Crisis," which showed a small portion of what it called the "Minneapolis mob."</p>
<p>"Inch by inch, the crowd moved close to the home, muttering threats," according to one of the witnesses. Their encroachment was watched from inside the darkened house. Behind the barricaded door and windows sat a phalanx of African American veterans and an arsenal of weapons. The Legionnaires had Lugers, Colts, rifles and shotguns at the ready; they had already declared their intention to use their military training to protect the little family.</p>
<p>With the backing of the NAACP, led by a militant lawyer named Lena Olive Smith, the Lee family remained in their little bungalow until 1933. But they were never accepted into the community they had sought to open up for African Americans.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of the crisis, some white residents were bitter about what they saw as their mistreatment at the hands of the mayor and police, blaming the Lees for the violence. "You know if there was any legal way of keeping a negro out of a white district and ruining the value of everybody's property for miles around, this disturbance would never have arisen," a disgruntled Minneapolitan declared in an anonymous letter to a public official. "You know when you hurt a man's pocket-book, that is something that is never forgotten. . .They talk about justice for the negro, how about a little justice for the white man who has put his life savings into a home."</p>
<p>In recent years, <a href="http://blogs.mprnews.org/cities/2011/07/event-remembers-black-family-terrorized-in-south-minneapolis/">a new generation of neighborhood activists have grappled with this ugly legacy,</a> commemorating the disturbing events of July 1931 and placed a plaque outside the Lee family home. The house <a href="http://www.mnhs.org/shpo/nrhp/docs_pdfs/0073_leehouse.pdf">was recently put on the National Register of Historic Places</a>, thanks to a <a href="http://www.startribune.com/local/minneapolis/268380722.html">group of activist-researchers</a> who have worked to recover the details of this episode in the hopes of helping our community understand the full scope of our collective history.</p>
<p><em>Kirsten Delegard is director of the Historyapolis Project, which is part of the history department at Augsburg College. The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. During 2014, Delegard is compiling an inventory of historical resources pertinent to Minneapolis with the help of a team of students and citizen-researchers associated with the Historyapolis Lab. For more details visit our website at <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/"><strong>www.historyapolis.com</strong></a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject"><strong>www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</strong></a></em></p>
</div></div></div>Thu, 31 Jul 2014 19:11:19 +0000Sarah McKenzie23357 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/revisiting-one-of-the-ugliest-chapters-in-minneapolis-history#commentsThe battle of the bookstoreshttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/the-battle-of-the-bookstores
<div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kevin Ehrman-Solberg</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>This weekend, Twin Cities Pride will celebrate the myriad aspects of GLBT life in Minneapolis, which revels in its designation as the “gayest city” in the United States. Pride began as a subdued picnic in Loring Park in 1972 and most people see this quiet gathering as the beginning of a new era of openness for gays and lesbians in the city. It took more than a picnic, however, for queer Minnesotans to win the social, political and sexual rights they enjoy today.</p>
<p>The struggle for these rights took place in a wide variety of community institutions. But a critical — and often overlooked — battleground for sexual freedom in Minneapolis was the city’s adult bookstores and movie theaters. From 1979 to 1985, the city’s growing adult entertainment industry was the site of intense conflict over the rights of gay men to seek sexual partners in public spaces. A critical turning point for gay rights in the city, this “battle of the bookstores” inspired queer Minneapolitans to seek real political influence in City Hall.</p>
<p><img src="/sites/default/files/resize/images/articles/06/26/2014/Adonis%20ad%20for%20Kevin%27s%20pride%20column-355x183.png" alt="" width="355" height="183" class="inline_image" /></p>
<p>In 1979, police launched a crackdown against the city’s growing pornography industry. They were under intense pressure from neighborhood activists, who objected to the proliferation of pornographic bookstores and movie theaters in South Minneapolis. The ensuing police campaign targeted gay men who used adult bookstores and theaters as sites for sexual encounters. Men in Minneapolis, many of them unwilling to self-identify as gay, had been using those spaces since the early 1970s as a way to engage in sexual contact without fear of physical violence or discovery.</p>
<p>The experience of Mark Weintrob was typical. On Aug. 17, 1982, Mark Weintrob left work and headed to the Adonis Bookstore downtown. He went up to the second floor where a small theater advertised “Hot Male Movies” from “Noon to Midnight.” After taking a seat, he noticed a man staring at him in the dim lights. The two men proceeded to engage in the “normal gay male cruising rituals” until the stranger finally took the initiative and asked Wientrob if he would like to “go somewhere a little more private.” Wientrob followed him to a small boiler room. There, the stranger asked: “Are you a cop?” Wientrob responded with a simple: “No.” “Well I am,” the stranger said, “and you’re under arrest.”</p>
<p>Wientrob became the first man to challenge such an arrest in court. He won, but very few of the men arrested for indecent conduct — a charge used almost exclusively for observed sexual conduct between consenting men — were willing to fight such a charge. Doing so meant public exposure, the very thing these men were trying to avoid.</p>
<p>That exposure could have dire — even fatal — consequences, as the case of the Rev. James Santo illustrates. On Dec. 14, 1982, Santo went into the basement of his Hopkins church and lit himself on fire. His death, and the subsequent investigation, made the front page of the Star and Tribune. “The fire,” the story reads, “which police said may have been caused by Santo pouring gasoline on himself, was preceded 12 hours earlier by his arrest on indecent conduct charges in an adult-oriented bookstore in Minneapolis.”</p>
<p>That line is the only mention of the indecent conduct arrest in the Star and Tribune coverage, but it hints at a problem that had been wracking the local gay community for years. Attorney Ken Keate, who regularly represented bookstore arrestees, reported that “about 5 percent of my calls on these cases are suicide calls.”</p>
<p>The undercover operations of the vice squad netted over 5,000 arrests for indecent conduct between 1979 and 1985. The vast majority of those arrests were gay men. In addition to the shame of such an arrest, many had to endure police brutality when taken into custody. </p>
<p>Activists began to mobilize against this harassment in 1979. But they made little headway until 1985, when a coalition of openly gay politicians and community members were able to force police to scale back their entrapment operations. The political muscle exercised by newly elected gay politicians Brian Coyle, Allan Spear, and Karen Clark, signaled a profound change in the dynamics of the local gay community. The Star Tribune, which had all but ignored the bookstore arrests, suddenly took notice. The paper remarked that the police department’s decision to end vice squad entrapment demonstrated a “broad and well-entrenched political base of support for gays” and was one of the first tangible signs of “growing gay political power.”</p>
<p><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Thu, 26 Jun 2014 20:51:02 +0000Sarah McKenzie23190 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/the-battle-of-the-bookstores#commentsThe demise of the Longfellow Zoological Gardenshttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/the-demise-of-the-longfellow-zoological-gardens
<div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kim Simmonds</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>As a devoted fan of the work of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, R.F. Jones paid homage to the poet by building a two-thirds-scale replica of Longfellow’s home in Cambridge, Mass. The large Georgian-style yellow house was situated to the west of the Longfellow Zoological Gardens where Jones created a home for his menagerie. The showman redirected Minnehaha Creek to create swimming ponds for his seals, and in addition to a monkey house and aviary, Jones built a huge arena to house and perform with his animals, which included tigers, bears and elephants.</p>
<p>The zoo proved incredibly popular, drawing thousands of visitors each year. In July and August of 1907, the year it opened, over 60,000 people flocked to view the “1,000 Living Sights.”</p>
<p>As attendance increased, Jones built a train around his property to make getting around easier for his guests. He referenced Longfellow’s “The Song of Hiawatha” by naming each car after characters from the epic poem, the train drawn by the engine Nokomis. As a special touch, Jones commissioned a statue of Longfellow in 1908, which sat central to the grounds — $5,000 was raised for the sculpture with contributions made by prominent families of the time, including the Pillsburys, Washburns and Savages.</p>
<p><img src="/sites/default/files/images/articles/05/28/2014/longfellowgardens.jpg" alt="" width="335" height="480" class="inline_image" /></p>
<p>Although the zoo did well for many years, it was not without problems. In 1907, Jones grieved the loss of both a beloved seal and a cherished Russian wolfhound. In 1909, an elephant became enraged and destroyed his 24-foot tall cage before his trainers could contain him, all while spectators looked on. Animal cruelty charges plagued the naturalist, from eagles with frost bite to starving lions. By the early 1920s, the beginning of the end began for the Longfellow Zoological Gardens.</p>
<p>By 1922, Jones’ neighbors were fed up from lack of sleep. Birds screeched late into the night, causing elephants to trumpet while the lions roared. After a petition was filed by a neighborhood committee to oust the eccentric businessman from his property, the Minneapolis Park Board began proceedings to condemn the property. Jones made a deal with them: He would deed the property to the City if he was allowed to stay and run his zoo for 10 more years.</p>
<p>Jones, however, would not live to see his zoo close. On Oct. 15, 1930, after an illness of four weeks, Jones died at his home. He was proclaimed “Picturesque City Figure” by the Minneapolis Tribune and buried at Lakewood Cemetery. Even though it was well known that Jones had deeded his land to the Park Board, his family contested the deed and his will, succeeding in keeping the zoo open for six more years.</p>
<p>Jones’ family managed to get the case to the Supreme Court, but the court found in favor of the city, giving the family until July 1936 to vacate the premises. Some of the animals were given to the Como Zoo in Saint Paul, and Jones’ son, Roy, made an effort to create the first floating zoo on the Mississippi on a ship called The Polar Bear.</p>
<p>After the zoo closed, the library board purchased the home and converted the house into the Longfellow Community Library. In 1968, the library was moved to the newly built Nokomis Library, and the bottom level of the house was used as a warming shelter for skaters on Minnehaha Creek in the winter months. In the 1980s, the house was recycled into a haunted house attraction during October, a fitting use for the house that had fallen into bad disrepair.</p>
<p>Luckily, a group of concerned citizens banded together and formed the Longfellow House Restoration Committee. They slowly began to make improvements on the structure with the help of local civic and military organizations. In the early 1990s, as plans were being made to build Highway 55 through the center of the property, the restoration group had the house moved to its present location at the intersection of Minnehaha Avenue and East Minnehaha Parkway. A land bridge now separates the house from the only remaining part of zoo, the statue of Longfellow. A few artifacts from Jones’ days survive, including his famous top hat and a suit jacket, on display with the hide of Hiawatha at the Hennepin History Museum. The Park Board now runs the house as a visitor center, open on weekends and holidays during the summer.</p>
<p><em>Today’s guest blogger is Kim Simmonds, alumna of the Augsburg College history program. A public historian currently working in a haunted historic house in Deadwood, South Dakota, Kim became fascinated with “Fish” Jones and began recording her findings on the Robert Fremont “Fish” Jones Facebook page while working for the Minneapolis Parks and Recreation Board. In part two, Kim continues the tale of zoo promoter and the Longfellow House.</em> </p>
<p><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
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</div></div></div>Wed, 28 May 2014 19:01:46 +0000Sarah McKenzie22992 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices/voices/the-demise-of-the-longfellow-zoological-gardens#commentsDowntown Minneapolis once home to eccentric zoohttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/downtown-minneapolis-once-home-to-eccentric-zoo
<div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kim Simmonds</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>You’ve probably passed it on your way to Minnehaha Falls, but you might not have noticed it.</p>
<p>At the corner of East Minnehaha Parkway and Minnehaha Avenue in Minneapolis sits a small yellow house in the Georgian style. The Longfellow Zoological Gardens was run here from 1906 to 1934. Thousands of visitors flocked to the site every year to watch the performing seals and roaring lions, but that is not the beginning of the story.</p>
<p><img src="/sites/default/files/resize/images/articles/05/14/2014/LongfellowSeals%20from%20kim%20simmonds%20and%20hclib-323x198.jpg" alt="" width="323" height="198" class="inline_image" /> Before the Minnesota Zoo, before the Como Zoo, and even before the Longfellow Zoo, the first zoo in Minnesota was opened on the third floor of a thriving fish market at 308 Hennepin Ave. in downtown Minneapolis.</p>
<p>In 1878, Robert Fremont Jones, an eccentric entrepreneur originally from New Hampshire, established a fish market to supply fresh seafood to the metropolitan area. His focus was on selling quality packed oysters sent by refrigerated car from the East Coast, and, according to Jones, “It was an overnight success.”</p>
<p>Having been an animal lover since his youth, “Fish,” as Jones was nicknamed, had an aquarium built in his store so that he could showcase rare species of fish and turtles.</p>
<p>Jones, always the self-promoter and unfailingly dressed to the nines in a Prince Albert suit, high heels and a silk top hat, soon added a seal to his collection to attract business.</p>
<p>Attract business it did, and Jones gradually installed more animals on the upper floor of his shop. In 1885, Jones sold the fish market and purchased a farm at 1600 Hennepin Ave., the current site of the Basilica of St. Mary. He moved his menagerie to the heavily wooded lot and continued to add to it. Soon Jones was sharing the grounds with horses and Russian wolfhounds, which he bred, as well as lions, camels and other animals. Jones’ favorite lion, Hiawatha, was born on the site. He also maintained a “fancy poultry farm” at the site, and the eggs produced by his chickens sold for $1 apiece.</p>
<p><img src="/sites/default/files/resize/images/articles/05/14/2014/1600%20Hennepin%20Ave%20from%20kim%20simmonds-263x197.jpg" alt="" width="263" height="197" class="inline_image" /></p>
<p>Jones loved to publicize his zoo by parading his animals downtown. He was often seen driving elegant carriages pulled by his teams of horses up and down Hennepin Avenue, his Russian wolfhounds trailing behind. One winter, a parade down Nicollet Avenue led to some backlash. The public though the cold weather too harsh for Jones’ camel. The eccentric showman responded by having a sweater and a pair of pants made for the desert animal.</p>
<p>Neighbors soon began to complain about the zoo’s smell, as well as roars and other noises. Jones chose to sell his land to the archdiocese in 1906, and purchased a plot of land called the Longfellow Lakelet near Minnehaha Falls that same year. Soon after his purchase, Jones made a trip to Europe on behalf of the Twin City Rapid Transit Company to acquire animals for a zoo to be opened on Lake Minnetonka. When the plans for the zoo fell through, Jones kept the animals and opened his own zoo near the popular falls.</p>
<p><em>Today’s guest blogger is Kim Simmonds, alumna of the Augsburg College history program. A public historian currently working in a haunted historic house in Deadwood, South Dakota, Kim became fascinated with “Fish” Jones and began recording her findings on the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/RobertFremontFishJones" target="_blank">Robert Fremont “Fish” Jones Facebook page</a> while working for the Minneapolis Parks and Recreation Board. In the first part of two, Kim writes about the man with a love of Longfellow and animals.</em></p>
<p><em>The Historyapolis Project seeks to bring fresh attention to the history of Minneapolis and is working to unearth stories that can explain how the city took shape. For more details visit our website at <a href="http://www.historyapolis.com/">www.historyapolis.com</a>. This project has been made possible by the Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which is administered by the Minnesota Historical Society. Find it on FB at <a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject">www.facebook.com/TheHistoryapolisProject</a></em></p>
<p><em>(Photo of 1600 Hennepin Avenue, c. 1885 is from the Minnesota Historical Society.) </em></p>
</div></div></div>Wed, 14 May 2014 21:26:17 +0000Sarah McKenzie22927 at http://www.journalmpls.comhttp://www.journalmpls.com/voices-feed/downtown-minneapolis-once-home-to-eccentric-zoo#comments